Embassy Row

“These regimes kill their own people, and some of them sponsor violent extremism and pursue nuclear-, unconventional- and ballistic-missile capabilities,” Rep. Ileana Ros-Lehtinen said, after the bank agreed to pay $88.3 million for violating sanctions against Cuba, Iran, Sudan and Liberia.

The Florida Republican applauded the Treasury Department’s Office of Foreign Assets Control for pursuing the charges against one of America’s oldest financial institutions.

JPMorgan Chase last week accepted the penalty after the Treasury Department accused it of “apparent violations” of sanctions that forbid financial transactions with the four countries.

The Treasury Department said JPMorgan Chase processed more than 1,700 transactions totaling $178.5 million to Cuba and made a $2.9 million loan to Iran. The deals were made between Dec. 15, 2005, and March 1, 2011, the department said.

The bank in a statement said the violations were unintentional, “rare” and “isolated from one another.”

Mrs. Ros-Lehtinen called on the State Department “to follow Treasury’s example and fully implement U.S. laws targeting these thugs.”

• Call Embassy Row at 202/636-3297 or email jmorrison@washingtontimes.com. The column is published on Monday, Wednesday and Friday.

About the Author

James Morrison joined the The Washington Times in 1983 as a local reporter covering Alexandria, Va. A year later, he was assigned to open a Times bureau in Canada. From 1987 to 1989, Mr. Morrison was The Washington Times reporter in London, covering Britain, Western Europe and NATO issues. After returning to Washington, he served as an assistant foreign editor ...